Joining my ship for the first time

H Hogarth and sons proudly acknowledged the title of "tramp", having a fleet of 59 such ships by the outbreak of the war and also having survived the depression and slump of the 20s and 30s without laying up a ship, in fact continuing a building program.
It was 1941 and only a week of Christmas holidays had passed when a wire turned up summoning me to join a ship at South Shields on at South Shields on 27th of December 27 of December. It added that if I was not there by early on the Monday morning it would be assumed that I was not coming and that would be the end of the matter. Papers were following.
There it was just like that and no other warning whatsoever. My mother had known nothing of my approach to the company and since the time when I filled out an application form, sometime in September, I had heard nothing.
my mother hurried to get together all the warm clothing she could find, not an easy task as we had moved to Shropshire are very hurriedly hardly a year previously and had been compelled to leave much of our belongings behind in Dorking. Anyway she managed to fill two small suitcases and thus, scantily equipped, I set forth for my first expedition into the real world on my own.
The post office was specially opened to find the letter from the company containing my indentures which had to be signed by a parent or guardian. Fortunately my brother Geoffrey was at home and he accompanied me to Shrewsbury in the train as there being no time to get the papers signed before the only train of the day left.
To get to Newcastle I had to first to get to York and the journey took ages. After I was conveyed around the countryside, every minute bringing a greater sense of loneliness and anxiety as to what I was to do when I reached Newcastle late at night. Obviously I would have to stay somewhere as no offices would be open at that time and I had no idea where the ship was or how to get to it. Somewhere in the Midlands, when I began to feel hungry I bought 2 pounds of biscuits and have always blessed the urge that made me buy so many because they were all I had to eat for the next two days.
Newcastle at last at half past 7 PM on a dark and cold night. I had never been there before and the realization that I'd have to find somewhere to sleep and that I was very tired brought a great wave of homesickness over me and then to be told at the first hotel that there was no room was awful. The woman at the reception desk looked me up and down and was not impressed. Disheveled, untidy, a teenager and not a little frightened, I obviously didn't look a good risk so she not unkindly announced that they were full up. Perhaps if she had realized the awful sense of despair that her words evoked. The sudden realization that I was on my own and there was nobody I knew to whom I turn to for the help and support a good home had always given me, she might have relented. As it was she said "no" and as far as she was concerned that was the end of the matter. With a last look at the warmth and lot of the lounge that I could see I made for the door and here had one of those pieces of good fortune that make life worth living. The night porter waylaid me as I left and said that if I couldn't find anywhere by 11:30 PM to come back and he would find me a place to sleep and be warm I thanked him and returned to the station, which was just across the road, too weary and frightened to seek any further and took my place amongst several other lost souls on a platform bench at length I dozed off only to be awakened by someone wanting me to lift my feet so he could sweep under the bench it was close to 11:30 PM by then so I made my way back to the hotel. My friend the hotel porter hurriedly ushered me into the boiler room to await the manageress retiring to bed and here in the wonderful warmth I fell asleep.
It was not long before the porter returned and brought me upstairs, gave me some tea and ushered me to a long couch. It was not long before I realized he intended to join me there so once more I headed back to the station.
When I think back on those first few days on my own and realize that, despite an expensive education, I really knew nothing about the world and how ill equipped I was to look after myself, I'm amazed that no effort was made to teach us any of these life skills. There were a number of organizations like the salvation army if I could have tried and of course I should've thought to ask a policeman, who would certainly have done something but none of this occurred to me. In the first 12 hours or so after leaving home there was so much I ought to have known about end it was more luck than anything that kept me from getting into real trouble.
I slept fitfully until about half past 6 AM when the buffet opened. At least it was warm in there and I waited until offices were open and went in search of the agents office feeling that the worst was over and that with any luck I soon find myself on a ship. Vain hope that proved to be.
The office was vast and imposing but the man who dealt with me was friendly and, after much telephoning, presented me with a card, on which was written the ships name and where she was berthed, and wishing me the best of luck, he sent me on my way.